Do Belarusian salaries correspond with prices for food and clothes?

There is a list of products (the necessary minimum) which a Belarusian inhabitant is supposed to eat during a day. This list includes:

Bread, white bread, flour, macaroni, rice, oatmeal, buckweat, millet, pearlbarley, peas, potatoes, cabbage, vegetables, canned vegetables, oil, butter, milk, sour cream, cheese, cottage cheese, eggs, sausage, beef, pork, paultry, fresh fish, herring, fruit, juices, sugar, dried fruit, tea, salt.

According to the calculations made by the European Radio for Belarus, a family of three people should spend only for food, not counting the necessary clothes, communal service payments etc., approximately 660 thousand roubles per month in order not to die of hunger. For comparison, an average salary in our country at present amounts to 1 million 130 thousand roubles.

Do Belarusian salaries correspond with prices for food and clothes? The European Radio for Belarus asked this question to the economist Siarhej Chaly.

“I would say it's the other way round - the prices correspond with salaries, moreover, correspond at full scope”, — says the expert:

“As our economical structure is highly monopolized, there's no room for competition, thus, the prices in such economy are set in accordance with ablebodied demand of the population. Roughly speaking, the prices will be set in such a way to let them take all your money, in any case.

It is very simple. Each increase of the population's incomes momentarily reflects on the common price level, in the first place it concerns prices for goods which make a considerable share of daily consumption: communal services, food...”

According to the economist, the poorest Belarusians suffer the most when salaries are increased, as this increase leads to corresponding increase of prices:

“Salaries are increased in such a way that the major part of this increase concerns the most highly paid categories of the population. But the prices increase frontally, they cannot be different for the rich and the poor.

The final result of such policy is that the categories which are paid the least suffer the most, although they were the ones the government intended to help. Increase of prices in the end of it all surpasses increase of their incomes, moreover, the prices get high exactly for the goods which make the biggest share in their expenses”.

The European Radio for Belarus addressed to the people at Minsk streets with a question: "Do you have enough money for all the food you like?". Here are the answers:

— Nooo, we don't!
— We don't.
— 15 thousand roubles of subsistence allowance - that's not life. I constantly feel lack of money.
— I have enough money for food, with the exemption of, probably, exotic fish products.
— I'm not sure. Probably, I don't have enough money for fruit. I would like to eat it every day, but I don't have such a possibility.